TEMPE, Ariz.—LaTroy Hawkins knew his instincts were more accurate than his hopes. He wanted to believe the men in the Los Angeles Angels’ suite at the Hilton Anatole hotel were giddy because he was coming in to sign the one-year contract they had agreed upon a day earlier.

Hawkins had just made the hourlong drive from his home in Prosper, Texas, to downtown Dallas, where baseball’s winter meetings were taking place in early December, and when he met with new general manager Jerry Dipoto and his team, the vibe was celebratory, almost euphoric.

Hawkins was happy he was received with such glee, but he also was realistic. The man knows his worth: He is a 39-year-old middle reliever who has played for eight teams in 17 seasons and compiled a 4.48 ERA along the way. He was there to sign a contract that paid him $3 million for a single season.

The joyous mood wasn’t because of him.

“They were just so excited, it made me think, ‘Damn, they’re pretty excited to be signing LaTroy Hawkins,’ ” he says. “But I’m not stupid. I liked to think they were that happy because of me, but come on. I knew that wasn’t it.

“And the next morning I find out they signed Albert Pujols and C.J. Wilson. Then it was like, ‘Oh, that’s why they were so excited.’ ”

And all it took to complete the franchise’s best offseason ever was an owner willing to move away from his old way of doing things, an aggressive and thoughtful courtship of Wilson, a simple but truthful word for Pujols, more than $317 million, and, finally, some timely cell phone service.

THE DIPOTO DIFFERENCE

Hawkins’ assessment of that hotel room was accurate. Dipoto and his associates had tried to contain their excitement because the deals weren’t completed, but it had come through in their demeanors. They knew at that time that landing two of the biggest free-agent prizes of the offseason was not only a legitimate possibility, it also was becoming more likely by the second.

“LaTroy’s read on that was spot-on,” Dipoto says with a laugh. “I’d be lying to you if I told you we already knew the outcome, but we had a suspicion. It was very energetic and positive in there. There was an air of energy in that room, and by the time LaTroy inked his contract, we were making real progress with those other guys.”

It was a long time coming, both for the free-agent process to bear fruit for the Angels and for Dipoto to rise to a position of serious power.

Dipoto, 43, spent parts of eight seasons in the major leagues as a reliever for the Cleveland Indians, New York Mets and Colorado Rockies, compiling a career 4.05 ERA. After that, he was a scout for the Boston Red Sox and the Colorado Rockies’ director of player personnel. He was hired by the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2006 and briefly served as the team’s interim G.M. in 2010, when he traded for pitcher Daniel Hudson, who played a key role in Arizona’s worst-to-first run last season, and Tyler Skaggs, one of the organization’s top pitching prospects.

Toward the end of last season, it became clear Dipoto was going to be a hot G.M. prospect. Last September, Diamondbacks general manager Kevin Towers, who beat out Dipoto for that position in 2010, told The Arizona Republic, “Do I think he’ll be a good G.M.? I think he’ll be outstanding.”

The Angels were in search of a general manager following the resignation of Tony Reagins two days after the end of last season. They liked Dipoto’s communication skills, that he had played in the big leagues and that he was a talent evaluator. They also liked his ability to embrace and comprehend advanced statistical analysis as well as the old-fashioned scouting aspect of the game. If he had been in that drab meeting room in the “Moneyball” movie, he would have perfectly blended the crusty old scouts with Jonah Hill’s frumpy but intelligent assistant G.M. character.

Two days before Halloween, the Angels officially introduced Dipoto as their general manager, a position that wasn’t always envied when Reagins held it because he didn’t have complete freedom.

RECENT DISAPPOINTMENTS

Arte Moreno bought the Angels in 2003, about seven months after the franchise had won its first and only World Series championship. He became the first Hispanic to own a major sports franchise and was immediately a fan favorite after cutting beer and ticket prices and showing a willingness to spend on the roster.

But by the start of last October, that goodwill had dissolved. The Angels, gaining a reputation as an underachieving and disappointing club during Moreno’s tenure, missed the playoffs for a second consecutive season and watched the rival Texas Rangers reach the World Series for the second consecutive year.

And the latest in a line of Angels offseason flubs was a contributing reason for the Rangers’ run.

Mike Napoli became a source of disgust for Angels fans. The Angels had sold him as a defensive liability behind the plate and had made him a key piece in a knee-jerk trade for the Toronto Blue Jays’ Vernon Wells.

How did that work out? Napoli was sent to Texas and hit .320 with 30 home runs and would have been the World Series MVP had the Rangers been able to close out the Cardinals. As for Wells, he hit .218 with a .248 on-base percentage.

Critics blasted the Angels for the trade and for the reasons it had been made. During Moreno’s ownership, the Angels had become known as a team the big-name free agents flirted with but left at the altar to marry someone else. The list is long and mostly distinguished: CC Sabathia, Mark Teixeira, Paul Konerko, Alfonso Soriano.

In the winter of 2010, the latest addition was Carl Crawford. The Angels were confident in their ability to sign him, but when the sides exchanged figures, Moreno wasn’t willing to pay Crawford’s asking price, and the outfielder eventually signed with the Red Sox. A frustrated Moreno told Reagins to make something happen, and the end result was the acquisition of Wells, whose $21.5 million per year was more than what Crawford received from Boston.

Moreno made it difficult for Reagins to deal with free agents because he would get heavily involved in negotiations and send deals south with his take-it-or-leave-it ultimatums. Manager Mike Scioscia also had his share of input on personnel decisions. Essentially, Reagins was seen as a figurehead.

“We’ve been pretty disappointed the last few years with all the talks of the Teixeiras and Crawfords and then missing out on them,” says staff ace Jered Weaver, who signed a team-friendly five-year, $85 million extension last August in one of Reagins’ better moves. “Normally I’m up on that stuff, but this year I told myself I wasn’t going to pay attention to it because it was frustrating in the past. Then the first thing I hear is we’re getting Albert Pujols and C.J. Wilson.

“It’s exciting for everyone here. You can feel it in the clubhouse now. This is a turning point for the Angels.”

WOOING WILSON

That shift started on the first official day of free agency last year. Dipoto and his team developed several plans, but Plan A had Wilson’s name in bold letters. He was the guy they wanted, and Dipoto called Wilson’s agent, Bob Garber, on the first day Wilson became a free agent.

“Jerry was aggressive,” Garber says. “He called us the first day, they were the first to fly us out, they were the first dinner I had at the G.M. meetings. It helped build trust for us. The whole thing could have fallen apart at any moment, but this doesn’t get done without Jerry.”

Wilson is an Orange County native, but growing up a traffic-filled drive from Angel Stadium wasn’t enough to get his signature on a contract. They needed to woo Wilson. Dipoto’s staff learned Wilson has a personal chef that cooks with only organic ingredients. So director of baseball operations Justin Hollander found Soho House in West Hollywood, a place that would appease Wilson’s palate and philosophies.

That was fine and dandy, but the Miami Marlins were itching to spend their money and offered Wilson a six-year contract, the kind of longevity he and Garber were looking for. Dipoto’s initial offer for four years wasn’t going to cut it, no matter what place they chose for dinner.

THE PUJOLS PLAN

Dipoto had contacted Pujols’ agent, Dan Lozano, early in the offseason, but at that time Pujols was more of a fantasy scenario. Still, Dipoto wanted to see what the ballpark figure was for the best hitter of his generation.

“From the very get-go, what we established was we were going to knock on all the doors and turn over all the stones on guys we thought could fit for us,” Dipoto says. “The way the industry operates, through the course of conversations you end up discussing a handful of players, and both Danny and Bob had (other) free agents. So you’re constantly digging.”

Dipoto brought his shovel to the winter meetings in Dallas that first week of December, and while he continued working with Garber on a deal to get Wilson, he again reached out to Lozano about Pujols.

Lozano told Dipoto that Pujols wanted to have his legacy closely tied with his new organization, not just with the St. Louis Cardinals, who at that point had turned off Pujols with an initial offer of five years. Dipoto’s ears perked up. He knew the Angels were capable of making that happen and contacted Moreno, who came into the talks on Dec. 6, discussing how the Angels wanted not only Pujols the player but also Pujols the man.

Moreno was willing to deliver the years and money, and he also wanted Pujols to stay on after his playing career. He described Pujols as his “partner.” Once Moreno came in to sell Pujols on the idea, Dipoto realized he was pursuing the top positional and starting pitching free agents simultaneously.

“It got exciting,” Dipoto says. “Just like when you’re a player, you know when the situation is more significant. You know if you’re pitching in the sixth inning down by five and you know when you’re pitching the ninth up by one.

“There was a different feeling in the air.”

If only he could reach into it and find a cell signal.

GOING UNDERGROUND

The Hilton Anatole hotel has two towers of rooms, and the only way for the public to get from one to the other is through the lobby. That posed a problem for Dipoto. The lobby was filled with reporters who would have held him up with questions at a moment when time was valuable.

To avoid that, Dipoto and his crew arranged for VIP treatment, having hotel security escort them through underground tunnels. It worked wonders, getting the team from tower to tower without the obstacles the lobby presented. But the lobby was above ground, where cell phones were able to receive and send text messages. Phones lost service in those underground passages, putting a chokehold on negotiations.

As Dipoto and Co. moved beneath the hotel on Dec. 7, Garber sent him a text saying there was a 9:30 p.m. deadline for the Angels to make a final offer to Wilson. The Marlins had put six years and $100 million on the table, and if the Angels couldn’t up their offer from four years and $60 million, Wilson was signing with Miami.

The problem was Dipoto couldn’t communicate via cell phone while he was jetting underground. He was trying to tell Garber to wait a bit for an answer while he pulled together the Pujols deal. As Dipoto moved between towers, he and his entourage worked to find a cell signal, going as far as using the security guard’s phone to try to text Garber.

“It was almost comedic,” Dipoto says. “You’re dying to get above ground so you can send the message along. We would have one or two members of the Angels and a security guard with us and we’re constantly passing cell phones back and forth to see if any of them had a signal. It made for an interesting evening.”

Garber again texted Dipoto asking if the Angels were willing to give a fifth year, and when Dipoto finally had cell coverage, he texted back, “Yes,” at 9:05 p.m.

Once Garber had that text, he knew Wilson would be an Angel, and the sides haggled into the early morning hours to seal the deal for $77.5 million.

SEALING THE DEAL

While the deal for Wilson was happening, the word partner was stuck in Pujols’ head. He loved the idea that Moreno saw him in that light. He felt appreciated because the Angels wanted him for 10 years on the field—for the price of $240 million—and for an additional 10 after his playing days were finished. About 7:30 a.m. on Dec. 8, only a couple of hours after the Angels had agreed to terms with Wilson, Pujols called Lozano and told him he wanted to be an Angel.

“Arte wants to win, and he was tired of losing those big guys to the Yankees or Boston or wherever. But this time he didn’t lose,” says team leader Torii Hunter.

When Moreno hired Dipoto, he vowed to give him the “complete power” Reagins never had. Whether it was because Moreno believed he had hindered past negotiations or because he sensed Dipoto needed little assistance other than a green light for years or money, Moreno gave Dipoto that freedom. When Dipoto did need help, Moreno stepped in and said exactly what Pujols needed to hear.

After just a little more than a month on the job, Dipoto had changed the face of the Angels franchise. He took them from finishing 10 games behind the Rangers in the division to a favorite to win the American League and Sporting News’ pick to win the 2012 World Series.

“I’m proud for the organization and what this could mean in the long term,” Dipoto says. “But the scout in me grades it as an incomplete because we still have to play it out on the field. I’m not in a position to look back on the offseason and relax yet.”

Moreno, Scioscia and the entire franchise can relax, however. Over a two-day span in December, Dipoto proved the Los Angeles Angels are in good hands.